


Causality

by karlark



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Sburb Session, F/F, Humanstuck, M/M, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, do people even want me to continue this?, possible davekat if people want it, there is now davekat
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-13
Updated: 2016-04-30
Packaged: 2018-05-06 14:32:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,444
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5420681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/karlark/pseuds/karlark
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rose is kind of sick and tired of everyone finding their soulmates around her. This Kanaya Maryam better hurry her ass up; Rose is kind of falling in love with this stranger she keeps meeting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> fair warning this wasn't edited too heavily. i just kind of skimmed over it, so if you find any mistakes please let me know!

Rose frowned down at the name circling her ankle. It read "Kanaya Maryam" in a beautiful, loopy cursive. She lifted her head when the bell on the door jingled. The people walking through the door were revealed to be a pair that looked to be about her age. 

The man was shorter than his companion, and seemed to be Hispanic. He had messy, dark, untamable hair and his face was schooled into one of aggravation. She had a feeling that was it's default expression, from the way he was ranting to his friend. 

His partner was, as noted previously, taller than him. She was of darker complexion than the man, and her hair was in a pixie cut. Her features were a bit sharp, but her lips were quirked in a pleasant smile that made her seem regal, if a bit sarcastic. 

Rose saw them head into one of the rows of shelves and sighed before going back to her book. She was rereading one of the books her mother wrote. It wasn't the greatest book, but it was always slightly interesting to see how her mother wrote, even if she has read the books once or twice before. 

She is abruptly shocked from her musings when a loud thud rings out from the back of the library, followed by a louder "FUCK!" She sighs in partial exasperation and partial amusement before standing and making her way to the aisle where both sounds rang out. 

It is revealed to be the man and woman she had observed earlier. The woman was standing back and watching the man struggle to but a bunch of books back on the shelf. The man is mumbling a bunch of obscenities to himself, looking up at his companion every few seconds. 

"Come on, help me out here, you asshole!" he whisper yells at her. "I don't want to be yelled at by some middle aged woman for disturbing her shitty books!"

This draws a short laugh from the woman. She looks up and meets Rose's eyes, and her own eyes widen. "I wouldn't be so quick to assume. I would, however, try to pick those books up a bit quicker." 

The man shoves a middle finger up in her face before deciding it was a bad idea and returning to picking up the books.

"I'm astounded, really, by how many books you knocked over," Rose finally states. "How did you knock all of these books over, if I may ask?"

The man looks up and his eyes widen. "Wait, fuck, are you... the person working right now? I'm so sorry. Fuck, I'm trying to pick them up, but I— my friend— knocked over like, the whole shelf. Haha... Fuck." 

She raises an eyebrow at him, noticing how he seemed to deflate at the sight of her. She didn't mention it. "It is alright. I can take care of this, sir. Don't be so hard on yourself." 

"I don't want to let you do it alone—!" 

"Sir, this is my job. I've certainly had to do a lot worse. Calm down." She crossed her arms, looking down at the man crouched on the ground. 

"But—" When he tried to argue, his partner tugged him up by his arm. 

"Karkat, I think it is time to go. Ms... Rose here probably wants to go back to reading at the front." 

Karkat sighed aggressively, tugging his arm away from his partner. "Fuck, fine. I've never met someone so eager to do their job."

Rose smirks at him. "I've never had someone as loud as you in a library, but hey, there is certainly a first time for everything."

"Am I still being loud? Fucking Christ. I'm sorry." It's almost comical how quiet his voice gets. It's as if he only has two settings— almost shouting or talking so low it's practically whispering.

She rolls her eyes and shoos him away. "Calm down. It was a joke. I am absolutely sure there is no one here who cares how loud you are getting." 

After exchanging a few more words, Karkat and his partner —who Rose is almost sad she didn't talk to talk to the beautiful woman— begin walking through the library again.

Rose puts the books all back on the shelf before standing up and walking back to her chair behind the counter. She settles down before picking the book up and continuing where she was. 

Another thirty minutes pass before anyone enters the store again. She looks up. The person is running right at her. 

She barely has a second to shove her bookmark in and toss the book the counter before the person barrels onto her. 

"Oof! Hello Roxy." Roxy squeals into her shoulder, and Rose lets out a quiet sigh. "What is it, Roxy? I can't understand you while you're screaming into my shoulder." 

Her sister finally lets go of her and then brandishes her arm. "I MET HER, ROSE!" she finally shouts at her, and Rose doesn't even bother telling her to lower her voice. Her eyes widen. 

"Did you not bring her with you? Roxy, you must introduce me to her—"

"I absolutely did! Where the hell is— JANEY!" Roxy darts out the library again and Rose waits a minute or two. She's about to get her book out again when Roxy flings open the door, dragging a chubbier girl along with her. 

They stop right in front of the counter, and Rose raises an eyebrow at her sister. She's grinning widely. "Alright, sis, this is Jane. Jane Crocker. Janey, this is Rose." 

"Uh, hello. I'm terribly sorry for just barging in like this... Roxy didn't tell me we'd be stopping by, and at a library no less. I'm sorry for causing a ruckus—" 

"Oh, no, you are not at fault here. And do not worry about being loud. This isn't a particularly quiet—" there's a muffled shout from the back, where she assumes Karkat and his partner have migrated to, "—library."

She leans forward, eyes narrowing as she looked right into Jane's eyes. "Do not harm my sister, Ms. Crocker. If you do, we will have a problem. I do not know my soulmate, and if you hurt yours, you will feel my wrath." She smiled thinly before sitting back down. 

"Alright!" Roxy exclaimed, clapping her hands together. "That got scary, Rose. Sorry, Janey. But I guess that's our cue to leave, huh, Rose?"

Rose raised an eyebrow. "I am planning on going on my lunch soon, yes." 

"Ohmigod, we should go, all three of us!" Her sister gasped. 

"Ah, no, I would not wish to impose on your time with your soulmate. You are still in your honeymoon phase, Roxy. Enjoy yourselves." _And not to mention,_ she thought, _that Jane looked scared as all hell at the idea._

She smiled proudly at herself and leaned back. Her sister and her soulmate left after exchanging a few words and Rose sighed. "I just want to read my book," she muttered. "Is that too much to ask for?" 

"I apologize for disrupting, but we've finally decided on leaving," the pleasant voice reached her ears. Rose placed a fake smile on her face before standing up and scanning the book the woman had placed on the counter. 

"Did you find everything okay, ma'am?" she asked quietly. 

"Yes, thank you. And—"

Her partner speaks up. "I'm sorry for fucking up the shelf! I swear I didn't mean to. It was a total accident—" 

"I have already reassured you, sir, that it is alright. It has been taken care of," she stated politely. "Is this all you wanted to purchase today?" 

"Yes, thank you," Karkat and the woman said in unison. They paid and immediately started bickering again. They bickered all the way out the door, and Rose settled back in her chair with a small smile. 

It wasn't until she got home that she realized she never got the woman's name. 

Why was she so attracted to her, then? She knew she was a flaming homosexual, but come on. She's not usually this attracted to some random woman she barely spoke to.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Dave, please tell me what the name on your collarbone is," she murmured, trying to be as quiet as possible. Her brother's eyebrows twitched. 
> 
> "Yeah, alright. It's Karkat Vantas," he finally responds. 
> 
> She snickered, immediately gaining her a suspicious look from her twin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is awful and i'm so sorry about that, but i havent updated since december and i wanted to get something up, soooo.. 
> 
> not edited. was also written over the course of 4 months, so not my best work. there's only going to be one more chapter, though, so look forward to that! i'll try not to take four more months to update this time haha... 
> 
> this is actually terrible i'm so sorry

For the rest of the week, Rose saw Karkat come in with a multitude of people. He looked the same every time — sullen and annoyed. 

He was pure anger when he came in with a blond male; the man had a heavy lisp and had heterochromia— one of his eyes was blue, the other was a light brown, amberish color. He seemed to love egging Karkat on, and the surly Hispanic took the bait every time. From one of his loud outbursts, Rose deduced the blond's name was Sollux. It was amusing, if she was to be honest. 

He was a little less angry when he came in with some woman— she was smaller than him— than Rose, even. She had short hair, almost like Rose's, but the red strands went everywhere. They were untamable— almost like Karkat's hair, except the redhead's hair looked less like bedhead and more like it was just under a hat more than half of the time. She was cute, in the most innocent use of the term. She seemed to make Karkat quiet down a bit; he didn't seem so angry around her. 

He was only the calmest, however, around the first woman Rose had saw him with. She soothed him, in a way. Whenever he started getting riled up, she'd place her hands gently on his shoulders and murmur a few words quietly before releasing him. Her words seemed to pacify him, if only for a few minutes. 

She had noticed that after a few minutes of them walking in, but now she was distracted by the door swinging open. 

It was revealed to be Dave Strider, her twin brother. He (and their younger brother, Dirk) had gotten their dad's last name, after their parents had split. He had a cocky smirk on his face as he sauntered over, launching himself over the counter. "Yo, Lalonde. I need a favor."

"I gathered as much. You don't make an effort to see your dearest sisters unless you need something. What is it, Strider?"

"I need a book. That will make me look smart," he began. Before he could open his mouth again, she interrupted him with a quiet laugh. 

"It'll be near impossible to make you look even the smallest bit more intelligent— if I were a stranger and saw you reading something like... Mother's books, for example, I'd label you as a douchey hipster. Not that I haven't already labelled you as that, of course," she responds, her signature smirk curling her lips. 

"You're a useless broad. I'm going to go pick a book and join you behind the counter." Dave sauntered away. There was no other way to describe it, really— he travelled from place to place as if he had no worries. She knew it wasn't true; their whole family was a bundle of stress and nerves. They all had ways of hiding it. 

"There's no loitering in here, Strider!" she called after him. "If I see you walking around in ten minutes and you haven't found a book, I'm kicking you out."

"Whatever, Lalonde," he called back, his voice fading as he disappeared behind a shelf. She rolled her eyes, picking up the pen beside the computer in front of her. She doodled in the corner of one of the many papers in front of her, paying little attention to the quiet murmur in the library. 

"Karkat, no!" 

She lifted her head; was that the mystery woman's voice? Rose didn't take her as the kind of woman to shout, unless it was for very serious reasons. 

"But, Kan—" That was Karkat, equally as loud.

"SHH!"

Rose paused, furrowing her eyebrows. Wait a second... 

"Dave!" she called calmly. "Can you come here for a second?"

"Why?" 

"Dave Strider, I am not going to ask again." 

After a few seconds, Dave rounded a shelf and slowly made his way over to her. "What, Lalonde? I was just about to find a good book, I could sense it."

"Dave, please tell me what the name on your collarbone is," she murmured, trying to be as quiet as possible. Her brother's eyebrows twitched. 

"Rose, I'm wounded. I thought you listened to me— I thought that, as much as you loved to psychoanalyze me, that you would at least listen to my problems. Oh, woe is me, my dearest sister; you wound me. I trusted you—"

"Dave."

"Yeah, alright. It's Karkat Vantas," he finally responds. 

She snickered, immediately gaining her a suspicious look from her twin. He whipped his shades off and leaned in, red eyes narrowed. "Rose, what the fuck are you not telling me? Rose, come on, stop fucking laughing!" 

She stopped herself after a few seconds, schooling her expression into a blank look. "Ah, nothing, my dear brother." 

"Rose, cut the shit," he began, pausing when she placed a finger on her lips in the universal sign to 'be quiet.' Spotting Karkat and his friend at the end of a shelf, when he opened his mouth to speak again, she cut him off. 

"You never know when your knight in shining armor will come and sweep you off your feet," she said, smiling coyly at him. 

"Rose," he muttered, annoyance coloring his voice. 

"Dave," she deadpanned, raising her eyebrows in amusement. 

"Karkat!" the woman suddenly exclaimed, and Rose's smile curled into a grin. Strider's head turned around so quickly Rose's own neck ached. 

"Wait, is your name Karkat? Karkat... Vantas?" her brother asked cautiously. 

The Hispanic furrowed his eyebrows, before nodding slowly. "Who the fuck are you?" he asked, mouth set in a scowl. 

"Uh," Dave paused, glaring at Rose through his shades when she snickered. "I'm Dave Strider." 

"Oh, shit," Karkat exclaimed, walking over very quickly and deserting his friend. She didn't look too bothered— her lips (painted a green that complemented her skin nicely) were curled into a small smile. " _You're_ Dave Strider? Fuck, you remind me of Eridan."

At this, Karkat's friend let out a scoff. "No, I'm sure Mr. Dave Strider here isn't as big of a douchebag as Eridan is, even if he appears that way."

"I'm not a douchebag, fuck you," Dave said, just after Rose snorted out a "I told you, Strider, you're nothing but a hipster douche." 

"Fuck, Kanaya. He is a douchebag," Karkat said, and. 

Wait. 

Kanaya?

"Kanaya?" Rose asked. The two men in the room turned to face the woman (no, _Kanaya_ ) at the same time as Rose. 

Kanaya's eyes widened, and she offered a shy smile. "Yes, hello."


End file.
